


How Dixons Do Halloween

by theramblinrose



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: AU, Caryl, F/M, Halloween fun, Mandrea
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-01
Updated: 2020-11-01
Packaged: 2021-03-09 05:01:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,320
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27329239
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theramblinrose/pseuds/theramblinrose
Summary: Caryl, Mandrea mentioned. AU.  It was the spookiest night of the year, and this was the way that all the Dixons did Halloween.  Loosely based on the As Dixons Do universe, but can absolutely be read alone.
Relationships: Andrea/Merle Dixon, Daryl Dixon/Carol Peletier, Merle Dixon/Andrea Harrison
Comments: 1
Kudos: 17





	How Dixons Do Halloween

AN: So, a few weeks ago, I mentioned, on Tumblr, my desire to eventually redo As Dixons Do (much like I’m doing with Of A Certain Age/An Innocent Man) to write what I really wanted that story to be.

Someone asked for a Halloween story and encouraged me to do it in the As Dixons Do universe. I chose to go with the feeling of the eventual redo that I hope to do, rather than strictly with the original version. 

I do hope that you enjoy this little fluffy one shot. I’m sorry it’s a little late! Please let me know what you think! 

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“Alright! Let’s get a move on!” Daryl called up the stairs. “The candy train is leavin’ the station! You better get on board ‘fore it leaves without you!” 

He heard a shriek. He heard another shriek. 

Everything went silent for a moment and he held his breath, knowing that it could go in one of two possible directions. The silence broke when the dam broke, apparently, and the wail of tears started.

“Hey!” Daryl called up the stairs. “I mean it! Stop messin’ with Mika!” 

Daryl knew the tears were Mika’s. He could identify the girls by their crying patterns. He had always been able to do that, even as the patterns changed from newborn to the most recent banshee-like wails of their resident freshly-minted teenager.

“She broke my glasses!” Mika wailed, stomping heavily down the stairs. For a moment, Daryl’s stomach seized as he imagined the bill for new glasses. He could feel the heat rising in him, and he was just about to let it all run out of him and over his two oldest daughters in a wave of fatherly wrath, when he remembered that Mika didn’t wear actual corrective lenses—that was Lizzie, though she never actually bothered to put the damned things on.

The glasses that Mika held out to Daryl, sadness streaking down her face, were just fake glasses that they’d bought to go with her Halloween costume. She was a scientist. Daryl accepted the glasses, surveyed the damage, and looked at his soggy child.

“Who done it?” He asked.

“Lizzie,” Mika sobbed.

“Elizabeth Dixon! Get down here!” 

Lizzie, her ghost costume wrapped around her shoulders instead of thrown over her head, came far enough down the stairs to peek around the wall where the banister connected. From there, she felt safe—caught in the in-between world that was not quite the upstairs and not quite the downstairs.

“It was an accident, Daddy,” she offered. Lizzie was only a year older than Mika—coming in at ten—and she never sounded quite so innocent as she did when she was informing them that something was an accident. “Honest,” she pressed. “I didn’t mean to step on ‘em.” 

“They was on the floor?” Daryl asked, directing his question to the daughter that was drying up her tears, but had now dissolved into the pathetic hiccupping sound.

Daryl lived in a deep and wide ocean of estrogen and tears. 

Just next door, his brother lived in a testosterone jungle, which made him feel a little for his sister-in-law, Andrea. Their shared solidarity was that they both knew what it was to be the “odd man out” in a house that was overrun with the opposite sex.

Daryl knew that the challenges he had to navigate, with four little girls of his own, were vastly different than the ones that Merle had to navigate with four boys. Being “Daddy” meant something different when all of your progeny were little girls.

Mika’s nod was sheepish. 

Daryl sighed. 

“When you put things on the floor, they get broke,” Daryl said. “That’s why we don’t leave our stuff on the floor.” 

“I didn’t mean to,” Mika offered.

“I didn’t mean to step on them!” Lizzie asserted loudly and somewhat defensively from the stairs.

“Get down here,” Daryl said. “Sophia! Come on! I mean it!” He shook his head at Mika. “The world ain’t endin’. Come on.” 

Daryl carried the glasses into the kitchen, pulled open the junk drawer, and fumbled around until he found the roll of masking tape that Carol kept in there. He pulled off a length and wrapped it securely around the broken bridge of the glasses. Then he offered them back to Mika. She put them on, the wad of masking tape sitting across her nose, and sniffled at him.

“Is it OK?” She asked.

Daryl smiled to himself. 

Of all his girls, Mika was still young enough and sweet enough to make him feel like his approval could make everything in the whole world better.

“Even better than they was before,” he said, patting her head gently so as to not mess up the French braids that Carol had painstakingly done for her. 

“For real?” Mika asked.

“A scientist like you? Smart as you is? They always got tape on their glasses.” 

“Why?” Mika asked.

“Prob’ly ‘cause they leave ‘em on the floor to try and tattle on their sisters when they get stepped on,” Lizzie growled from across the room where she was tying her shoes, her ghost costume still a cape more than anything.

“Lizzie,” Daryl said, pointing at her. It was really all he needed to do, but he was irritated enough that he wanted to say his peace. “One more smart-ass remark and you’re gonna sit right outside with all of us and hand out caramel apples all night—and I won’t let you eat a single one of ‘em!” 

“Yes sir,” Lizzie said, just loud enough to not get reprimanded for disrespect. Daryl looked back at Mika. 

“They don’t get their glasses fixed ‘cause they’re too busy comin’ up with important shit. Like cures for big diseases and things that’s gonna save the world. They don’t got time for things like fixin’ glasses…so they got tape on ‘em when they break. You fine. Makes you look even smarter than you looked before.” 

Mika was pleased with the tape, now, and she went to get her own shoes on.

“There she is!” Daryl crowed when Sophia came walking, heavy-footed, into the kitchen. “My first born. A beacon of joy and happiness for all.”

Sophia frowned at him. She was freshly thirteen and frowning seemed to be one of her favorite hobbies. Carol assured Daryl that she would grow out of it, and it was likely that it would only take five to seven years for that to take effect.

“What’cha ‘sposed to be, Soph?” Daryl asked, picking at some popcorn out of the large bowl that was popped and waiting on the bar. The adults would be sitting in the yard between their two houses tonight, handing out treats to the neighborhood kids. Carol and Andrea had dipped and individually wrapped caramel apples for days. There were piles of them everywhere. Daryl had popped enough popcorn to keep them snacking for the whole night and, currently, Merle was outside—dressed as Dracula—setting up the cast-iron cauldron he’d washed to heat the apple cider they would drink over a small fire. The kids loved, every year, coming by the house with the real witches’ cauldron.

“What do you think?” Sophia asked.

It was hard to tell if it was a playful challenge or a grumbly-ass teenager challenge. It was difficult to tell, these days, what their bouncing baby girl’s mood was, after all, at any given time. Daryl decided to give her the benefit of the doubt, though. 

“One of them sparkly vampires?” Daryl asked.

Sophia huffed. Daryl laughed to himself. Clearly, he’d guessed wrong. It didn’t matter. He was nearly impervious to all manner of huffs, sighs, and other feminine signs of disapproval. To survive, he’d developed a skin not entirely unlike the armor on an armadillo.

“It’s a secret?” He asked.

“I’m a Rockstar, Dad,” Sophia said. 

“Dad,” Daryl mused. “Dad—when the hell did I become Dad?” 

Sophia didn’t respond. She just tied her sneaker laces and stood up to pass out the plastic pumpkins to her younger siblings.

“Y’all get cold,” Daryl said. “Make sure you come back for jackets. And stay with MJ and the boys. I don’t want y’all splittin’ up. He knows you gotta come back by the house every hour to check in. If you don’t, I’m comin’ lookin’ and you ain’t gonna like it. You’ll probably never live down—not as long as you live—Frankenstein throwin’ your ass over his shoulder and carryin’ you to the car.” 

“MJ said we’re gonna do the neighborhood and walk down to corner to get a slurpee at the store,” Sophia said, approaching Daryl. Her surliness had, somewhat magically, dissolved. He could see her mother, now, around her features instead of the signs of the inner demon that sometimes possessed her. She raised her eyebrows hopefully—there it was. There was Carol’s face, practically, looking back at him in miniature. “Can we have some money for the slurpees?”

“Please?” Lizzie and Mika echoed in perfect harmony.

Daryl already knew about the slurpee plan. Morticia Addams—who was normally known to them as Andrea—had dropped by earlier carrying their youngest dressed as Gomez. She’d brought a sack of apples covered in the hardened caramel and wrapped for handing out. She’d also warned Daryl that MJ wanted to take his little train of Dixon ducklings down to the store. 

The corner store that they went to was one of the establishments that sold live bait in and among the food. Frank Dubin, who ran the store, had run the store for as long as they’d lived there, and he was no stranger to the Dixon clan. 

Daryl already had the five dollars in his pocket. He pulled it out. Sophia’s eyes lit up and she reached her hand out. As the oldest, she’d be the keeper of the money. Daryl withheld it a moment.

“One for each of you,” Daryl said. “Nothin’ else. You’ll be gettin’ plenty of junk tonight as it is. And you come right back here bringin’ one for your Ma. She’ll want the cherry kind.” 

Sophia nodded.

“You want one?” She asked. “Because we’re gonna need another dollar if you do.” 

Daryl shook his head.

“Just for her,” Daryl said. “You keep an eye on your sisters. Remember you gotta check in every hour.” 

Sophia held her hand out for the money again.

“I got it, Dad.” 

“Who the hell am I?” Daryl asked.

The corner of her mouth turned up. There he was. Lost in a collection of Carol’s features, there was one small piece of him that Sophia had retained from the very first smile she’d blessed them with as an infant.

“Daddy,” she said.

“And don’t you forget it,” Daryl said. “I mean it. I don’t like Dad.” 

“Yes sir,” Sophia responded. 

“Be careful, and help MJ look out for the boys, too.” 

“Yes sir,” Sophia responded. She closed her hand around the five-dollar bill that Daryl gave her and surprised him by wrapping her arms around him without any prompting or request. He relished the hug. Sometimes he was never sure when they would come and, sadly, when they might stop entirely. He hugged Lizzie, too, and helped her line up her eye holes so that she could see well. He hugged Mika, lifting her off the ground like she liked and growling in his best Frankenstein voice. 

Then, they all disappeared out the door, squealing.

Their cousins were waiting outside. Children were starting to flow out of their houses, and the sound of laughter and squeals were beginning to fill the streets. 

Out front, Daryl could see his brother—in the same Dracula costume he wore every year—practically dancing around the cauldron while Andrea, her newborn wrapped to her body, arranged caramel apples on the folding card table they brought out every year.

“You about ready, woman?” Daryl called back through the house. He didn’t have to wait long, though. 

Carol came out of the bedroom—in the back of the house—where she’d been nursing and preparing Judith, their youngest, for her first Halloween. 

Carol was dressed in the loose black dress of a witch, still a little self-conscious of the tummy that hadn’t entirely disappeared from bringing Judith into their family, and she was wearing a hat on her head. In her arms, Judith was awake for a short period of time. Daryl walked over and gently plucked the newborn from her mother’s arms to cuddle her.

“She all ready?” Daryl asked.

“Fed and changed,” Carol said. “So, she’s ready until the next thing she needs.” 

Daryl leaned and kissed Carol. Fifteen years of marriage and four baby girls hadn’t dulled his love for her even the slightest bit. If anything it just made him love her even more—every single, new facet of her that he discovered as the years passed and life molded them constantly into slightly more seasoned versions of themselves.

“She oughta be good for—oh half an hour, at least,” Daryl teased. “Merle an’ Andrea’s done set up outside.” 

Carol nodded.

“Popcorn?” 

“Popped,” Daryl confirmed.

“Girls?” 

“Gone with the boys,” Daryl said.

“Do we look alright?” Carol asked.

“Beautiful,” Daryl said. “Most gorgeous damn witch in the coven, and the cutest little black cat on the block.” 

Carol smiled warmly at his compliment. 

“You carry Jude,” Carol said. “I’ll get the popcorn.” Daryl nodded his agreement and followed her out the door. Outside, Merle was arranging the chairs where they’d sit, close together, and pass the night handing out caramel apples, telling stories and laughing, and checking in on their six little monsters as they terrorized the neighborhood with every other child still young enough to enjoy the magic of the spookiest night of the year.

This was the way that the Dixons did Halloween, and Daryl loved every minute of it.


End file.
